Truth be told, I don’t get out much and as the Kronos Quartet pointed out back in 1988, Winter Was Hard.
This past Saturday I hopped in my wagon, filled its tank, and headed West for about 40 miles to Allentown, PA where Barry and Erik Konigsberg have a lovely shop called BEK Hifi. I’ll let you figure out the origin of the acronym and I recommend a visit to the BEK HiF website to get the full details on the well curated lines they carry.
This was my first visit to BEK, remember I don’t get out much, and upon entering I was greeted with a blast of color both hot and cool and if you ask me our lives need more color because color soothes. In addition to the highly saturated walls, room treatments, and art, there was loads of gear set up as systems as well as even more standing in the wings in BEK’s four nicely-sized listening rooms.
As this was a DeVore Fidelity event along with Box Furniture, both Brooklyn Navy Yard based businesses, there were four DeVore-fronted systems on display featuring the company’s gibbon Super Nines and three Orangutan models—the O/93, O/96, and the star of this event, the DeVore O/Bronze. I reviewed the O/Bronze last September (review) and own the O/96 (review) as well as two racks from Box Furniture so BEK HiFi turned out to be a home away from home, so to speak.
But a hifi event is about more than gear, they’re also about people, music, listening, and talking. After an intro from Erik Konigsberg, Anthony Abbate of Box Furniture spoke about his racks followed by John DeVore who spoke about his ape-named speakers with a focus on the Orangutan series and the O/Bronze. Both presentations were relaxed and informative and I learned more than a thing or two which is a very welcome kinda surprise based on my long history with both brands.
And that’s one funny thing about hifi people—some audiophiles who have never built anything hifi-related let alone run a business doing so still, against those odds, believe they know more than the people who do. And this level of delusion can raise to such reality-denying extremes that all these all-knowing backseat designers need do is look at a photo and they’re locked, loaded, and ready to speak with damning faux authority on design choices, performance, and value. This may sound like harsh judgement but if being called out by facts sounds harsh, don’t blame the facts.
John DeVore spoke in some detail about his design process that includes both measurements and listening and how the balance between the two tends to skew more heavily toward the former in the early stages of a new design and then towards the latter once that design is reaching its final stage of development. DeVore also shared details about how things like cabinet shape, materials, driver positioning, crossovers, ‘gentle’ horn-loaded tweeters, internal bracing, port tubes, wood, bronze, and more effect the sounds that speakers make as well as how some of them directly impact how a speaker behaves in a room. I think it’s more than safe to say this presentation amounted to an ‘elevator speech’ that touched on a few highlights seeing as a speaker like the DeVore O/Reference was eight years in the making.
The O/Bronze are a direct descendant of and incorporate a number of O/Ref bits including the same tweeter as used the in the O/Ref, the cast bronze parts some you can see and some you can’t, and some elements of the cabinet construction some you can see, some you can’t. I’ll let my review cover a more detailed description of the O/Bronze as well as my in-depth listening impressions.
For this BEK event, the O’Bronze were paired with Pass Labs including the Class A XA60.8 monoblocks, XP-22 line level preamp, and XP-17 phono stage. During my stay LPs spun on a Brinkman Bardo turntable/Tonearm 12.1 combo mounted with a lovely Hana Umami Red cartridge and everything sat on a Box Furniture Heritage rack and Heritage amps stands. Cables and power conditioning came courtesy of Shunyata with room treatment from Nihon Onkyo Engineering. I admit I was more involved in photos and conversation than listening but based on the listening I did I can say two things—the O/Bronze remain my ‘some day’ speaker and this system proved the point that driving Orangutans with solid state is more than OK.
Let’s dispel this online myth—the DeVore Orangutans are meant to be used with tube amps. While there is an element of truth here, a wee bit seeing as one design goal of the O-series was to build speakers that could be driven by low-powered tube amps, there’s nothing about their design that makes them unable to perform well with solid state as this system at BEK soundly illustrated. While some care needs to be taken when picking an amp—for any speaker—the O-series impedance at 10 or 12 Ohms for the O/93 & O/96 and O/Bronze respectively may make some amps less than ideal partners. Of course any power-hungry speaker that dips below 2 Ohms like some multi-driver species from other manufacturers have more stringent requirements, a bigger ask, of the associated amplifier(s).
Getting back to people, this was a great crowd and the overall vibe was positive and fun. There were plenty of questions posed after each presentation, an obvious indication of engagement. Food and drink were aplenty and I had a number of great conversations with former strangers who share in the enjoyment of this wonderful hobby. I am happy to report that it’s the case more often than not these days that when people who recognize me at hifi shows or events come over to say hi, they mostly want to talk about music. And I couldn’t be more pleased. In my experience, that reaches back some 20 years, people who want to talk about music are interested in a conversation and sharing whereas people with gear-related questions are often looking for me to share a short shopping list.
From my point of view, the BEK HiFi / DeVore event was a rousing success. Some attendees, who are also BEK customers, traveled from far and wide to be there which is the best indicator of the real value good hifi dealers offer. I’ve said it before but I’ll say it again here—if you want to talk to people who have real knowledge and experience putting together systems, and let’s stress that point because putting together systems is infinitely more valuable than reading a review of a DAC or cartridge, get yourself to a hifi dealer. Considering the investment we all make in our gear, it’s more than worth your time to travel to a dealer that meets your needs. Who knows, you may even make new friends.
